Cowsourcing: tracking the health of the herd in real time

Two technology companies have developed a system that uses
tracking collars to allow farmers to monitor herds of cows in
realtime.

Zebra Technologies Corporation and GEA Farm Technologies have
developed CowView, a system which uses individual collars to track the
location of each cow in a herd. The collars not only track location
data within an accuracy of 30cm, but also behaviour data, for
example the amount of time spent in the stalls, the amount of time
feeding and the distances they are walking. All of this data is fed
into a system that can handle more than 1,000 tags at the same
time.

The system can generate alerts for any abnormal behaviour and
can help farmers find individual sick cows or track the health of
the herd over time. The data can be accessed through an application
on a PC, tablet or smartphone. If farmers need to find a particular
cow that is ready for milking, needs medication or monitoring, they
can open up their mobile app and find the cow within 30
seconds.

CowView

The system uses Zebra's ultra-wideband technology for the
localisation and tracking as it delivers a wireless signal with no
interference and extremely fine resolution over 183m. This is
picked up by receivers placed at regular intervals within the cows'
living quarters.

The collars themselves have been designed to be extra durable,
lasting for at least seven years. Trials across Europe -- involving
4,000 cows in seven sites in Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark
-- have found that farmers will have made back the cost of the
system within two years through efficiencies gained.

"The biggest challenge in developing the system was, in the
first instance finding a real-time location solution that would
deliver the fine resolution of data needed to deal with a large
number of individual animals in a confined area," Jill Stelfox,
General Manager, Zebra Location told Wired.co.uk.

Farm Technology: CowView System Monitors The Herd in RealtimeWired UK

A number of RFID-based systems were trialled, but GEA found that
Zebra's system was the most robust.

Stelfox added in a statement: "For the first time, farmers can
now obtain a full and continuous analysis of the position and
behaviour of each individual cow and use this knowledge to ensure
the wellbeing of their animals, as well as increase productivity
and efficiency. They can now manage larger herd sizes without
increasing costs."

The same technology could also be used for tracking vehicles in
automotive manufacturing and a version of it was used at Washington
Hospital following 9/11 to track patient movements.